Related papers: On the Limits of Consensus under Dynamic Availabil…
Blockchains are meant to be persistent: posted transactions are immutable and cannot be changed. When a theft takes place, there are limited options for reversing the disputed transaction, and this has led to significant losses in the…
Today's blockchains suffer from low throughput and high latency, which impedes their widespread adoption of more complex applications like smart contracts. In this paper, we propose a novel paradigm for smart contract execution. It…
Nakamoto consensus, the protocol underlying Bitcoin, has the potential to secure a new class of systems which agree on non-mathematical truths. As an example of this capability, we propose a design for a trustless, data availability oracle.…
Recently, the blockchain technique was put in the spotlight as it introduced a systematic approach for multiple parties to reach consensus without needing trust. However, the application of this technique in practice is severely restricted…
With the rise of cryptocurrencies, many new applications built on decentralized blockchains have emerged. Blockchains are full-stack distributed systems where multiple sub-systems interact. While many deployed blockchains and decentralized…
Despite their increasing popularity, blockchains still suffer from severe scalability limitations. Recently, Ethereum proposed a novel approach to block validation based on Data Availability Sampling (DAS), that has the potential to improve…
A blockchain replaces central counterparties with time-consuming consensus protocols to record the transfer of ownership. This settlement latency slows cross-exchange trading, exposing arbitrageurs to price risk. Off-chain settlement,…
Layer-2 protocols can assist Ethereum's limited throughput, but globally broadcasting layer-2 data limits their scalability. The Danksharding evolution of Ethereum aims to support the selective distribution of layer-2 data, whose…
With the rapid growth of hyperconnected devices and decentralized data architectures, safeguarding Internet of Things (IoT) transactions is becoming increasingly challenging. Blockchain presents a promising solution, yet its effectiveness…
Blockchains with smart contracts are distributed ledger systems that achieve block-state consistency among distributed nodes by only allowing deterministic operations of smart contracts. However, the power of smart contracts is enabled by…
Reaching consensus -- a macroscopic state where the system constituents display the same microscopic state -- is a necessity in multiple complex socio-technical and techno-economic systems: their correct functioning ultimately depends on…
Blockchain as a promising technology is gaining its popularity ever since proof-of-work based Bitcoin came to the world. Nevertheless, Bitcoin achieves consensus at an expensive cost of energy. Proof-of-stake is one of the solutions for…
Optimistic responsiveness -- the ability of a consensus protocol to operate at the speed of the network -- is widely used in consensus protocol design to optimize latency and throughput. However, blockchain applications incentivize…
Blockchains are becoming increasingly relevant in a variety of fields, such as finance, logistics, and real estate. The fundamental task of a blockchain system is to establish data consistency among distributed agents in an open network.…
This paper presents a study of the Poof-of-Stake (PoW) Ethereum consensus protocol, following the recent switch from Proof-of-Work (PoS) to Proof-of-Stake within Merge upgrade. The new protocol has resulted in reduced energy consumption and…
Many blockchain-based protocols, such as Bitcoin, implement a decentralized asset transfer (or exchange) system. As clearly stated in the original paper by Nakamoto, the crux of this problem lies in prohibiting any participant from engaging…
Blockchain-based IoT systems can manage IoT devices and achieve a high level of data integrity, security, and provenance. However, incorporating the existing consensus protocols in many IoT systems limits scalability and leads to high…
Despite broad use of BFT consensus in blockchains, censorship resistance is weak: leaders can exclude transactions, a growing concern for trading and DeFi. We address this by introducing a new abstraction and protocol stack. First, we…
Data Availability Sampling (DAS), a central component of Ethereum's roadmap, enables clients to verify data availability without requiring any single client to download the entire dataset. DAS operates by having clients randomly retrieve…
Blockchain has been regarded as a promising technology for Internet of Things (IoT), since it provides significant solutions for decentralized network which can address trust and security concerns, high maintenance cost problem, etc. The…